It was put to Mourinho on his arrival in Jakarta, where Chelsea on Thursday play an All-Star XI, that his compliments towards Moyes were a calculated act designed to destabilise the Barclays Premier League champions.

Mourinho’s sole remaining transfer target is a Manchester United player and Chelsea last week had a bid for Wayne Rooney rejected by United, who say the striker is not for sale.

Mourinho said: “If to say that my colleague in Man United is a great coach, he deserves success, he deserves time to work, he didn’t win trophies at Everton because it’s difficult to win trophies there... If to speak good about him is to play mind games, what do you say if I speak bad about him?

“The best thing is not to speak, and if I don’t speak nobody says nothing.”

Like Moyes, Mourinho believes it is better to sign players early in the transfer window. But, unlike United, Chelsea have already recruited Andre Schurrle, Marco van Ginkel and Mark Schwarzer this summer.

“He’s right,” Mourinho said. “The sooner you have the players, the better. You know the squad you have, you know what you have to work with, you have time for that.”

The Portuguese warned Chelsea’s Premier League rivals of the dangers of doing late business in the transfer window, which this season closes on September 2nd.

“Many clubs are waiting to the last moment to make their decisions,” Mourinho said. “The problem is that those decisions affect not just one or two clubs, but a lot of them. The one who sells has to go and buy, then they have to buy to replace, so no club is safe. Until the last minute somebody can go there and steal a player. I don’t mean steal a player, but steal the balance that a manager has when he’s working with a team.

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“In that aspect, we are lucky because we don’t have players to sell, so none of my players is leaving under any circumstances. That’s good for me, but many teams will be until the last moment under pressure, without knowing how the squad is going to be.”